The Spirit is Willing, but the Chef is Weak
by Icarus Isambard
Summary: With Sebastian micromanaging meal preparation in the Phantomhive kitchens, the only way chef Baldroy can get noticed is by bringing out the heavy firepower. Maybe it's time for Bard to take his culinary education into his own hands, even if it means overcoming demons of the non-Sebastian kind. If he fails, his finger is on the chopping block. The butler never makes empty threats!
1. 1 - Strawberry-Flavored PTSD

**1 - Strawberry-Flavored PTSD**

"Look! Oh, look! The strawberries are in!" Young gardener Finny bounded into the kitchen and dumped the contents of his basket out on the table where chef Baldroy was energetically flattening out the top crust for a pot pie. The berries tumbled everywhere—into the dish of egg whites the chef had planned to brush over his crust, into housemaid Mey-Rin's unfinished tea she'd forgotten to tidy away, and onto the floor. They left pink trails of juice as they rolled across Bard's slab of dough, and it happened so fast that he vigorously squashed a dozen of them with his rolling pin before he realized it.

"What's all this then?" Strawberry juice had spattered the chef's face, as if he'd been witness to very violent crime against farm-fresh produce. The once-pristine white dough had become the site of a pulpy, scarlet massacre. "I jus' barely got the smoke marks off the ceiling from this mornin'. Now my crust is ruined, and the sight of it is triggerin'…flashbacks." He lit a cigarette with slightly shaking fingers. "Poor blighters, those strawberries. Dyin' for no worthy cause onna field of battle because SOMEONE threw 'em over the table with NO plan or fair warning given. They bled out under my rolling pin with no chance to retreat. And their juice is now on my hands, Finny. My own hands!"

"I'm so sorry!" Finny wailed as he scrambled to scoop the heap of strawberries back into his basket. "It's just that I've waited all month for them to ripen, and they taste so sweet and I just wanted you to—"

"Don't take another step!" barked Bard, his rolling pin raised. "There's at least a hundred more of 'em underfoot. An' you've caused enough collateral damage already." He pointed to the floor, and the juicy pink footprints left by the gardener. The imagined pain of the strawberries in their death throes skittered up through Bard's nerves like electricity. "How'd you like if someone did that to you, huh?" These last words came out of the chef's mouth in a more menacing tone than he'd intended. Before he could backpedal and explain that he hadn't meant it as a threat, Finny burst into tears.

"I got enough people yellin' at me all the time," the boy managed between sobs. "I don't need you to hate me, too." Finny ducked under the table and crawled about collecting runaway berries, though he probably just wanted to hide his tear-streaked face. "Strawberries are supposed to make you smile, not stress you out."

Bard sucked on his cigarette to calm himself, and the lit end flared up with a bright orange glow. By the time he realized it had burned down to a column of ash, the ash had already crumbled out over the table, the strawberry pulp and dough, and into his pot pie filling. Finny, his basket, and most of the unscathed strawberries were gone.

"All this mess wi'out even touching a flamethrower." Bard fetched a mop, bucket, and washrag, and prepared to start his dinner prep from square one. He didn't have time to go after Finny, and anyway the kid always managed to bounce back. He'd be his old cheerful self before teatime.

"Is something the matter, Baldroy?" The familiar silky voice never failed to make the hair on Bard's neck prickle.

"No sir," said the chef. "Not as such. Well…not more than usual, Mr. Sebastian. Why do you ask?"

"You're wearing your goggles, Baldroy." The butler stood in the doorway out of the way of the chef's mop, his hands tucked behind his back.

"I always wear 'em."

"Around your neck, yes. But when you wear them over your eyes, it can only mean one of two things. Either you are about to engage heavy weaponry within the unsuitable confines of your kitchen—"

"I wouldn't dream of it, sir. Not after the poached egg this morning. I know, I know, poaching an egg don't mean using a hunting rifle on it, but jus' the idea had such a romantickal ring to it that I couldn't help…"

"—or," continued Sebastian, "you've been crying. Has something upset you, Baldroy?"

"What? Me? What could possibly upset me? Besides you, o' course." Bard pulled his goggles down off his face. "My eyes get a bit puffy when I wear 'em, but that don't prove nothing."

"I just scolded Finny for throwing strawberries at a tree. After he apologized for wasting perfectly delicious food—which I then confiscated, as they would make for a delectable strawberry bottereaux to serve with the Young Master's tea—he mentioned a possible flaring up of your post-traumatic...complications."

Bard slumped onto a stool and lit another cigarette. "They were all innocent strawberries, sir, an' never knew nothin' but sunlight an' rain. At worst a butterfly, maybe. A rabbit. But these hands…" He held up his red-stained fingers and waggled them, and his own face blanched at the grotesque sight. "Thanks to these 'orrible hands, they're now mutilated beyond recognition, an' are not even fit to be enjoyed by the Young Master, memorialized in a nice trifle pudding." He let his head fall forward onto the freshly-wiped table and pressed his forehead to the damp wood.

"You know," said Sebastian calmly, advancing with the strawberry basket under one arm, "a particular wickedly joyful expression springs to mind, one which I saw on your face just last week when the manor was attacked by those half a dozen marauding hooligans. It was at the very moment you shattered that lit bottle filled with kerosene all over them. I believe you found it rather…fun?"

"That was loads of fun! But they was all bad men, and would'a killed us if we hadn't got 'em first. Strawberries, though. Them's innocent in a way few people are."

"I could be wrong," said the butler, "but I don't think strawberries have feelings. Not in the way people do."

"Well, lucky them."

"This isn't really about strawberries, is it, Baldroy?"

The chef shrugged. "Do you think after you've selected the best fruits for that botter-whatever teatime pastry, I could use the bruised ones for a compote? If the Young Master don't want it, maybe us downstairs folks would, with warm vanilla custard on top."

"A fine idea. The bruised berries, though unsightly, often have the most flavor. Isn't that right, chef?"

"Aye. It takes one to know one, sir."

"And I trust you already completed dinner preparations?"

"Well, umm…as a matter o' fact, I'm just about to start. Though I'm sure tossing a handful of saltpeter into the oven will really speed things along—"

"Compote, Baldroy. Stick with your compote. I'll handle dinner, as the Young Master isn't feeling particularly peckish. But." Sebastian pronounced this last word with emphasis, waiting for the chef to look him in the face before continuing. "When you make your custard, Baldroy, cook it on a very low heat. And don't stop stirring for a second. Can you do that without distraction, at the very least?"

"Yes. I can do that. Probably."

* * *

"This is so good!" Finny helped himself to a third bowl of compote, and poured so much custard over the top that it flowed over the sides. He, Bard, and Mey-Rin sat at the table in the kitchen that evening. In the light of a single candle, newly washed pots and pans glistened on the drying rack. "I like the sauce. It's not even burned!"

A smile flickered over Bard's mouth. He did not mention that it took him three tries to attain a batch of custard that did not char to the bottom of the pan for one reason or another.

"Where did you learn to make this?" asked Mey-Rin, tasting daintily from her spoon, though she, too, was on her second helping at least. "Chef school?"

"Chef school? That ain't an actual thing, is it?" Bard scoffed. "We had berry pudding in the infantry, as a treat, though we used to call it other names, like massacre pie or placenta or—uh, never mind. It ain't fittin' table talk."

"Your hands are shaking again, Bard," said Finny.

The chef glanced down. "So they are. It's those strawberries, damn them. Bruised, know-nothing, idiotic strawberries."

Finny grasped one of Bard's hands, and Mey-Rin reached for the other. They sat silently for a while in silence watching the candle stub out, while the end of Bard's cigarette glowed bright each time he sucked down the smoke.

"Well don't you three look comfortable." Sebastian glided into the room holding a tray of Lord Phantomhive's half-eaten dinner.

Bard dropped Finny and Mey-Rin's hands and thrust his own under the table.

"The Young Master heard mention of your famous strawberry compote, Baldroy, and I believe he is actually eager to try it."

The chef lurched to his feet. "What? Eager? For my massac—placent—compote? You aren't serious, sir."

"I may not be serious, but he is. I blame some sentimental childhood memory and though I tried to warn him off, he insisted. Ordered me, actually. So." Sebastian's eyes seemed to glow for a moment like cigarette ends, and his hair ruffled despite the absence of wind. "Allow me to dish it up in a proper parfait glass."

Bard couldn't help himself, and bowed in Sebastian's direction. "Tell 'im the pleasure is all mine, sir. I prepared it all on the stove as you said, with only one blast of the flamethrower—"

"WHAT?"

Bard flattened himself against the wall, hands raised. "I jest, I jest." His cigarette pointed at the ceiling when he grinned.


	2. 2 - You Can't Unboil an Egg

**2 – You Can't Unboil an Egg**

"What are you doing up so late, Baldroy? The rest of the household is in bed."

"'Cept fer you, Sebastian, sir." Bard sat at the kitchen table, painstakingly dipping a pen into a pot of ink and transcribing letters with the concentration of a diamond cutter. That the letters appeared to constantly revolve and switch places before his eyes did not make things easier. He hated all writing—and reading—because the mischievous letters hated him right back, and hid from him, and taunted him with their general screwing around. "Line up, you damned berks," he muttered when the letters he'd just written as "desserts" rearranged themselves into "stressed". Which one had he written? The wrong one of course.

"Are you…writing?"

Bard leaned over his paper to hide his inevitable errors from the butler's gleaming eyes. "I'm just drawin' up the menu for tomorrow, just to save time. That's what the chef does, innit?"

"Well…"

"I thought we could take advantage of surplus supplies an' seasonal produce, an' anyway, it's all very cost effective that way—"

"Baldroy." Sebastian placed a firm hand on the chef's shoulder, and Bard tossed his pen across the room in fright. Ink sloshed from the inkpot and spattered his unfinished menu draft. "I am the one who plans the young master's meals, not you. When it comes to matters of cuisine, I am the one who knows what the Earl of Phantomhive desires. No ingredient, no matter how exotic, is beyond my reach. Your instinct for proletarian thrift is charming, but has no place in an Earl's kitchen. I certainly won't stand for serving the young master—what is that you've scrawled there?— a Ploughman's Lunch. And you can take your zucchini muffins to the ammunition dump that is your pantry and blow them to kingdom come."

"But I've got to use up the bumper zucchini crop somehow, sir. If Finny found out I was detonating 'em, he'd launch me at the moon."

"Then you and Finny can run the eight miles to our nearest neighbors, abandon the lot of them on their doorstep, and pretend you're doing it 'just to be nice.' Take care you don't get shot. Because that would be my first reaction, if I were them."

"But I—"

Sebastian slid his own beautifully calligraphied menu in front of Bard's nose, though not close enough for the end of the chef's cigarette to scorch it. "Tomorrow the Earl of Phantomhive shall breakfast on smoked salmon tartlets with crème fraîche, and at noon dine on mustard and tarragon phyllo pastries topped with a berry glacé. Tea shall be accompanied by a rhubarb pear napoleon, and for supper you will serve a hearty lamprey and kidney pie with a side of gingered carrots in aspic."

Bard stared at the butler's menu, but couldn't make sense of the spiraled, swirling handwriting. "I'll…plan to peel the carrots then. And…core a pear."

"Excellent. And I'll need you to wrangle the lamprey out of its natural habitat. But don't even think about touching the salmon. It is already pre-smoked." Sebastian gracefully took a seat opposite Bard. "And since you seem so suddenly to have gained a modicum of initiative, I shall sit here until you have successfully recited my entire menu back to me, including the ingredients and preparation times required—for you—to prepare each dish. It's past midnight already but I don't need much sleep myself."

Bard sighed. His eyes throbbed. "Initiative. What was I thinking. I must 'ave rolled oregano into my cigarette by accident. Why must you be so damned inconvenient?"

"Yes, what an inconvenience I am. How inconvenient of me to happen upon the sole survivor of a slaughtered battalion, a survivor who surely would have died of exposure, or shot himself out of despair, if not for my interference. It was in a strawberry field as I recall. I remember the smell of them, mingled with blood."

Bard stabbed his cigarette end into a saucer.

Sebastian cocked his head, and the ghost of a smile twitched his lip. "You never did eat any of that compote yourself, did you?"

The chef tore a strip from his own failed attempt at a menu and rolled it into a new cigarette.

"Well," continued the butler, "if you'd rather end up choking to death on gin in some filthy gutter, say the word." He leaned in and held Bard's eyes in his fiery gaze. "That future is written right…there." He tapped the chef's forehead with a gloved finger. "Your dismissal can easily be arranged. It's not like you'll be missed."

Bard sat very still through all of this, though his eyes twitched without him realizing it. "You bastard. How do you do it?"

"Do what, Baldroy? The seven-layered napoleon? Or the glacé?"

"Well yeah, them too. I meant, how come you can say all that to me, and basically tell me to go off myself, and I…I feel like I'd rather die than leave. I'd step in front of a bullet for the young master, an' maybe you too. You fucking blighter."

"It's called emotional manipulation, Baldroy."

"The hell it is."

"If you're feeling wretched, throw yourself at my feet. You'll experience an invigorating sense of self-worth, and I'll promise not to laugh. Loudly, that is."

"I'm not that far gone yet."

"Au contraire. I have you eating from my palm. If that initiative of yours begins to get in my way, however, be warned that I have the power to provoke from you theatrical outbursts that will forever alienate your friends. All two of them."

The chef sat unmoving, as if he'd become suspended in a clear aspic jelly. Just as Sebastian opened his mouth to suggest that he start his menu memorization, Bard interrupted.

"So I guess gettin' the Earl's permission to go to chef school to actually, you know, learn my bleedin' job, is too much initiative fer this household."

"It might be, Baldroy. It just might."

"It'd make your life easier though, eh? An' the Earl has plenty of coin. Unless you think I'm some sort of threat to your bond wi' the young master."

Sebastian gave a shark-like grin that made Bard regret he'd started this conversation in the first place, and fed into it for so long. "A threat? Certainly not. Though I don't see how you learning to boil an egg and butter toast will ease my many duties in the least."

A thought flashed through Bard's mind, a thought he didn't dare voice out loud. If he were to become a competent, hirable chef, he could find employment in any number of houses in Britain or abroad. But if this were prevented, he would only ever have one home. Here.

Was that so bad? Sebastian, despite his snark, did not seem that eager to banish him from the manor. Sebastian didn't want him hired—or hirable—anywhere but here.

"Le Cordon Bleu looks down on stove-top cordite use, Baldroy. You would despise every minute of it. At least here you may dabble in your hobbies as long as you apologize profusely and do the repair work yourself."

True. Where else, Bard thought, could a man with a hankering for firepower keep a gatling gun in his pantry?


	3. 3 - The Spatula of Seduction

**3 – The Spatula of Seduction**

_Author's note: Yeah, so this one got away from me in the most hilarious way. Probably the naughtiest thing I've written here (no worries, it's still rated T). Enjoy._

* * *

"Mey-Rin." Bard rapped softly on the maid's bedroom door. "The house is asleep. The moon is up, the stars are out, and I've a hankerin' for something sweet. Let's do it."

He could feel the faint vibrations of her footfalls through the old wooden floor as she approached. The door opened a crack, just wide enough for him to see the glint of a single, un-spectacled eye and a lock of her red hair.

"I can't," hissed Mey-Rin. "We shouldn't. Sebastian'll hear an' it'll be all over for the both of us, it will."

"He won't hear. And if he does, he won't care. He didn't hear last time, did he?"

"That was one time, and it was months ago. I can't go pushing my luck like that, Bard. An' besides." Her tone darkened. "How could I ever face 'im again, if he caught us? I'd rather die."

"If he catches us, we invite him to join right in. Psychology, that." Bard leaned in at the door so that his nose nearly touched hers. "Come on, it'll be fun."

"Did Finny hear you leave? I wouldn't want him to feel, I don't know, left out or whatnot."

"Finny? Now you're bringing up Finny? This is our thing, Mey-Rin. A few pleasant hours in a life o' drudgery. You mention his name once more, and I'll go back to my own bed all on my own. You don't want that, do you?"

The door opened wider, and Mey-Rin leaned her head and shoulders out. She wore a plain nightgown with ruffled hem, and her feet were bare.

"Are you—are you still wearin' your apron, Bard?"

"'Course I'm wearing my apron. Goggles, coat, the whole bit. You rather I didn't?"

"No, it looks right lovely it does. But I…would you rather I put on my pinafore then?"

"Pinafore? No need to get fancy on my account. Just grab some shoes so you don't stub a toe. Then I'll be forced to carry you downstairs over my shoulder. But you'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Mey-Rin didn't answer, as she had ducked back inside her room. When she opened the door again, she wore a pair of old ballet slippers and a dressing gown. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders. "Sorry if I cling to yer arm too tight. I can't really see anything closer'n that far wall there. Stairs are beastly, they are."

"Indeed," said Bard, and flashed her a grin and swept her into his arms. " Lemme help you with that."

They descended the servant's staircase from the attic past the upper and main floors toward the cellar. Mey-Rin clutched Bards goggles and pressed her cheek against his neck. "Will you let me hold the spatula this time?" she murmured.

"Spatula? Did you want it last time? Why didn't you say nothing?"

"Well you're the chef, and I figured you know what yer doing 'round the kitchen and all. But I want to get better, I do. Maybe you could do more teaching this time, an' I won't just sit there while you charge on ahead wi' me barely able to follow what's going on."

"Such a harsh mistress." Bard pushed open the kitchen door with his foot, and with his cigarette lit the gaslamp on the wall. "Next you'll make me promise to go to that chef school or whatnot," he said, setting her gently on the edge of the table.

"You should, Bard. Yer an idiot if you don't try."

Mey-Rin swung her legs as Bard rummaged in the kitchen drawers. "Spatula for the lady," he said, placing the rubber scraper in her hands. "An' here's your bowl and measuring cups. I even brought you a bag of chocolate shards because we…" he lowered his voice… "are making brownies."

Mey-Rin grinned and pulled Bard's goggles up over his eyes. The chef helped her down off the table, then stood behind her, guiding her hand with the measuring cup into the flour, then her other hand with a butter knife to scrape off the excess.

"There. Now the cocoa powder. Give it all a good stir. I'll get the chocolate melted on the stove."

"Sebastian will kill us, Bard, he will."

"No 'e won't. Not if you're the one to do the caramelizing wi' the flamethrower, not me. And I know you want try your hand at that, don't you?"

Mey-Rin nodded vigorously.

"I can think of only one thing that will get us both torn limb from limb by a certain butler." Bard lifted the spoon coated with melted chocolate. He touched it to his nose so that it left a little chocolate mark, then daubed Mey-Rin's cheek. "This." And he moved in to kiss her.


	4. 4 - The Cigarette of Contrition

_Author's note: Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read and/or review. This is my first foray into writing for such a huge fandom, and while I can tell I don't fit the typical demographic, if I can give you "the feels" then my job is complete :)_

**4 – The Cigarette of Contrition**

Bard came to the next morning with his wrists handcuffed to one leg of the massive kitchen table. Someone had propped him in a chair, and he must have spent the early morning hours with his face pressed into the table's rough wood so that the grain imprinted on his cheek. His right eye throbbed in his skull. Every part of him hurt, far worse than the usual hangover induced by an evening at The Queen's Jug. The smell of burnt chocolate hung in the air, making him feel all the more ill. He reached for the envelope of tobacco and cigarette papers in his back pocket, but was stopped short by the cuffs.

"Bloody hell."

A key scraped in a lock. Bard glanced up to see Sebastian swing open the kitchen door, looking as sleek and polished as ever.

"Good morning, Baldroy. What a joy it is to see you awake and in your kitchen at such an early hour."

"You did this to me, didn't you? Bastard."

"Consider the possibility," said the butler smoothly, "that you brought this upon yourself. Though I admit I slept easier knowing you would not bring the house down around our collective ears in a moment of thoughtless rage."

"Bah. When d'you ever sleep? You're a spoilsport of the worst kind. She was in to me."

"Was she, Baldroy?" Sebastian sat down across from Bard and folded his hands neatly on the table. "Or was the promise of chocolate sweets her motivation du jour?"

"What?" Bard thought of the warmth of her cheek against his throat when he'd carried her down the stairs. The way she'd leaned back into him when he'd guided the measuring cups in her pliant hands, so that he could feel the blades of her shoulders through his double-breasted coat. "Then she led me on in the worst way."

"Oh she did, did she?"

Bard glanced around the room. An upturned mixing bowl lay near his feet, and the tile floor was blanketed with a fine sifting of flour, sugar and cocoa. A spatter of footprints—his own larger soles and Mey-Rin's smaller ones—were pressed into the flour, looking like a diagram of ballroom dance steps. The ceiling above the stove bore a large soot-black mark. The drying rack had been swept clean of pots and pans, which lay tumbled about the sink. When he looked down at his apron, he noticed that someone—Mey-Rin?—had drawn a heart in chocolate on the front of his jacket. He could still taste chocolate, too, but by now it had gone a bit sour.

"Well, I'd say it takes two to make a mess like that, sir."

Sebastian stood suddenly and leaned over the table. With a gloved hand he grabbed Bard's collar and would have lifted him to his feet if not for the cuffs. "You know how I feel about fraternization among my staff, Baldroy," said the butler, his eyes flashing yet his voice deceivingly calm. "I never want to catch the two of you down here after hours again. Understood?"

"I—mind the bruises, a'right? That bloody 'urts."

"It _should_ hurt," hissed the butler. "Miss Mey-Rin has a fine right hook. She gave you the worst of it. Wielded the spatula like the pâtissier you only wish you were, and gave you a fine whisking. At least from what I saw from the doorway."

"Mey-Rin?" Bard tried to think, but his brain felt as fuzzy as spun sugar. She'd wrapped her fingers in his hair, hadn't she, and pulled his face down to meet hers? And they'd danced a slow sway across the floor, with no music or proper steps, just two lonely people pressed one to the other, accompanied only by the smell of the chocolate. His only memory of the spatula was when she'd scraped it gently down the back of his arm. "If it were her, I'd like to at least remember it. I almost might 'a enjoyed myself, if only I was into that kinda thing."

"Well…I'll admit it wasn't all Mey-Rin." Sebastian released Bard's collar. "But you are getting the worst of the collective punishment because I need to trust you with the manor and the junior staff when I'm away. And I can't very well leave it in the charge of a pyromaniacal libertine, can I?"

"Is that what I am to you? It's just that a man can feel caged here sometimes."

"You were just telling me yesterday that you would rather die than leave."

"I—" Bard scowled at the butler, who smiled politely back. "Fine," he spat. "Do your worst."

"Very well." Sebastian folded his hands and continued to stand smiling in his impeccable black tailcoat that wafted gently in some invisible breeze.

"Alright," grumbled Bard after undergoing the butler's silent treatment for roughly a minute. "I get it. You win." He unclenched his fists and bowed his head. "Just tell me what to say that'll get you to undo these cuffs. If I don't have a cigarette my heart'll stop."

"You could kowtow."

"Kowtow? What the 'ell is that?"

Sebastian glanced at his pocket watch. "Never mind, there's no time for a lesson. Just say that special little phrase, and say it like you mean it."

"Sebastian sir, I'm sorry I was disobedient to you, an' behaved disgracefully to Mey-Rin, and I'll never do it knowingly again."

"Not that phrase Baldroy. The other one for the young master. I need to ensure that you still sound sufficiently dedicated to his service."

Bard sat up as straight as he could, let his eyes rest on a stain of soot on the far wall, and shouted, "Yes, my lord!"

Sebastian removed a tiny silver key from his pocket and inserted it into a slot in the handcuffs. As Bard rubbed feeling back into his wrists, Mey-Rin opened the kitchen door. She took a few steps in before she flushed bright red, and stopped in her tracks. She started to back herself out of the room, but Sebastian froze her with a look.

"Do come in, Mey-Rin. Baldroy has something to say to you."

"I do?" Bard deftly rolled a cigarette before Sebastian could change his mind about uncuffing him. He had to force himself to look in the direction of Mey-Rin's eyes which she'd hidden again this morning behind her thick glasses.

"Yes," said the butler. "That first phrase from before. Now is the correct moment."

"But Mey-Rin," said Bard, beseeching the scarlet-faced maid. "You didn't mind kissin' me, did you? You seemed eager enough, an' you even pushed my goggles up on my forehead when they got in the way."

Mey-Rin wrung her hands. She stared first at her shoes, then turned her tumbler-thick glasses in Sebastian's direction. Her mouth moved slightly.

"Please speak up, Mey-Rin," said the butler. "We can't hear when you mumble."

"Well if'n I'm to be honest," she said a shade louder, glancing at Bard, "the kissing weren't half bad, 'cept maybe fer the s-smoke. What you did next wi' your hands though, that crossed the line, it did. I'm not that k-kind of girl." She looked back at the butler and wobbled on her feet, as if about to faint. "Am I?"

"No, Mey-Rin. You behaved well enough given the circumstances, though you really must learn to avoid being led astray by profligates such as Baldroy in the first place."

"It—it won't 'appen again, sir. I p-promise." The tilted up her glasses slightly as if to wipe away a smudge, and shot Bard a murderous look.

Bard couldn't even summon a smirk. Was Mey-Rin twisting the truth? Had she perhaps caught a glimpse of a certain butler in the doorway, and then changed her mind about the whole thing? He blew a funnel of smoke at his shoes in exasperation.

"Bard," barked Sebastian, and the chef jumped in spite of his determination to remain externally unruffled. "Where is that apology? I want to see a formal one. Like I taught you."

Bard pressed his palms to his apron and bowed from the waist, until his back was parallel with the floor. "I beg your forgiveness, Mey-Rin," he said, holding the bow, "for my 'orribly presumptuous behavior towards you. I also apologize to both you and Mr. Sebastian for burnin' the chocolate, ruining a good pan, an' knocking a bowl of flour to the floor in my shameful state of distraction."

Mey-Rin said nothing, and Bard wondered if she'd already fled the room. Sebastian cuffed him smartly on the head. "Rise, idiot. Mey-Rin, I want you to wash and press every curtain in this house. Baldroy, you will clean this kitchen until it sparkles while I go dress the young master."

"Yes sir. And for the earl's breakfast, sir?"

"For the young master's breakfast you will sit there on your hands touching nothing, as you contemplate my own competence and your utter lack thereof."

Just after Sebastian had left, Finny stuck his head in the door, his expression reading full saturation on the enthusiasm scale. "It smells like brownies! For breakfast!"

"They're all burned up, Finny," said Bard darkly as he sloshed his mop across the tiles. "Burned to hell. Along wi' everything these hands 'ave ever touched. Now even Mey-Rin's turning against me. Stand back if you don't want to be next."

Finny's smile faltered. He had a brown paper package clutched to his chest. "I'll just leave this here then." The boy darted in and dropped the package on the table. "You an' Mey-Rin are both so weird this mornin'," he said sulkily, then fled for the gardens.


	5. 5 - The Earl's Breakfast

**5 – The Earl's Breakfast**

Bard picked up the package and turned it in his hands. He recognized his own name written directly on the paper wrapping in large block letters. A longer message followed, but he couldn't decipher it no matter how hard he stared. Letters dodged away from his skimming eyes, and entire words blurred out of existence. Only when he lay his finger across each line of text, then moved it to uncover one syllable at a time, could he made sense of the message.

_Dear Bard,_

_Thank you for the strawberry pudding! We were so excited about the first compliment you ever did get from the Young Master on your compote and custard, we pooled our wages and got you this two-book set. The lady at the shop said that any chef worth his salt knows these recipes by heart, so you probably already know them, but it would look so nice on your shelf!_

_XOX Finny_

Something else below Finny's message had been scribbled out, and under it was penned:

_sorry bout your face. you got carried away and so did I – m.r_

Underneath that was a third message in slanted calligraphy that Bard recognized at once from the daily menus:

_If you can impress the Young Master or myself with any of these recipes, he may deign to consider sending you for the qualification exam at a local culinary institute. If your initiative sets the building on fire, however…_

_-S.M.-_

Bard cut the string and slit the paper with a fillet knife. Inside was indeed a two-volume set of cookbooks. He slide his finger over the title. _Mastering the Art of French Cooking_. He flipped through it, but there were not nearly enough pictures. His eyes settled on one particularly frightening recipe that filled three pages with text as dense as nine-days-old pease porridge.

"Boeuf a la Bourguignonne," he read, awkwardly sounding out each syllable. Strung together, they sounded to him like some sort of incantation for summoning the devil.

"Indeed," said Sebastian's silky voice, startling him. "Boeuf a la Bourguignonne is a deceivingly complex traditional beef stew of red wine, onions, bacon and mushrooms, frequently served over boiled potatoes with a side of buttered green peas, though the young master prefers his with mashed parsnips and celery root. The description sounds simple enough, but you'll notice that the ingredient list takes up most of the first page. You'll also notice that several of the ingredients—such as the consommé broth-require their own separate preparation. And most madding for you, Baldroy: it requires four hours of braising to attain its complex flavor mélange. What a wonderful idea for tonight's dinner, yes?"

Bard quickly flipped to another page. "Let's try somethin' easier. Like this one." He squinted at the page. "Crème anglaise custard with floating meringue islands and spun sugar cages. You 'ear that? Custard. You know I can do custard." He could feel a smirk pull at his lips.

"Very well." The butler glanced at his pocket watch. "It is now eight in the morning. The young master will be hosting a dinner tonight for a trade delegation from the Bay of Fundy. I shall add your crème anglaise and sugar cages to the menu. You have exactly nine hours to prepare your dish, enough for twelve servings. I expect you to present it in person directly to the Earl of Phantomhive and his guests. That way he can lay his compliments—or punishment—directly upon your head before the entire party, and I plan to back him up in any way I can."

Bard winced.

"By the by, your eye has swollen into a nasty purple bruise. A second punishment in one day might not be advisable, Baldroy."

"I'll take it an' like it, sir. I'm not afraid to reap what I sow."

"I'm sure. You radiate nothing if not contrite meekness, Baldroy. As for the Boeuf Bourguignonne," Sebastian continued, and flipped the book shut. "A Phantomhive butler who can't prepare it alone, and entirely from memory, isn't worth his salt." He brushed past Bard and reached for a pan. "But first things first. The breakfast for the young master this morning is Crépes Suzette. You shall sit on your hands, as I told you earlier."

Bard scrambled around the table to block the butler from opening the pantry door. "Let me do breakfast, please Mr. Sebastian. I almost got the knack of flipping 'em last time, but I need the practice."

Sebastian's glare would have brought Bard to his knees if he hadn't been propped against the pantry door. "You have only nine hours to prepare your custard and sugar cages, Baldroy. The seconds are slipping away, and I feel that without adequate preparation time I would be placing you at an unfair disadvantage."

"I'll do breakfast too! It's my kitchen. A chef has rights, don't he?" Bard tried to snatch the pan from the butler's hands. Sebastian was quicker. He raised the pan, then swung it at Bard's head, stopping a mere cigarette's length from his nose.

"This from the man who thinks an acceptable picnic lunch consists of live pigeons and a blowtorch. Your initiative only tries my patience."

"When you tell me to make _squab a la Wellington_, I hear _battlefield rations for a cagey old soldier_. I don't know why you was acting so surprised, you didn't draw me a picture or nothing. But you hired me, an' you get what you pay for. Just sayin'."

Sebastian thrust the pan into Bard's shaking hands. "Remember, these are to be crépes _Suzette_, Baldroy. Not _en flambé_. You will find the recipe on page 191 of volume I."

* * *

"Ooh, what are those?" asked a wide-eyed Finny as he and Mey-Rin arrived for the late-morning servants' breakfast. "Giant chocolate wafer biscuits? There's hundreds of them all stacked near to the ceiling!"

"They aren't chocolate, Finny," said the maid. "I think them's burnt. Pancakes or somesuch."

"Crépes," said Bard, pouring a watery yellowish sauce from a pan into a shallow dish. "But if you crumble 'em over this orange-butter glaze an' eat it with a spoon, they don't taste half bad."

"And…and Mr. Sebastian let you serve that to the young master?" asked Mey-Rin, pushing away the fork Bard placed in front of her.

"Of course not," said Bard with a grin, and lit a fresh cigarette in the gas burner of the stove. "But a master marksman or fencer, 'e don't become a master in a day. Even the Earl of Phantomhive himself didn't become an earl overnight."

"Well actually—"

"You don't make a perfect crépe the first time out, an' not without breaking no eggs neither. But in the course of my practicin', Sebastian gave up on me and threatened to chain me to the table if I didn't stand aside while 'e whipped up his own batch in three minutes flat. After 'e left though, I got it inna end. Two perfectly golden crépes. Sliding 'em out of my pan was almost as nice as kissin' a certain lovely young thing-"

Finny's jaw dropped. "Bard, have you got a…?" He turned to the maid, who shook her head vigorously.

"It's a figure of speech, Finny. He's tryin' to be poetickal, but it really ain't working."

"Mey-Rin." Bard thought he caught a glimpse of the maid's eyes through her bottle-thick glasses, and resisted the urge to slide up next to her by rolling his next cigarette. "You don't think I'm poetic?"

The maid dipped her finger into the dish of orange glaze. She gave the substance an experimental lick, then said, "You're more a man of rash action than romantickal words Bard, you are. A whole lot of bluster and noise, wi' nothing to show for it."

Bard set two plates on the table. "This one 'ere is yours, Finny. One crépe spread wi' melted chocolate, a mutilated banana, more chocolate, an' whipped cream. Sebastian said if I fed it to the Young Master he'd die of insulin shock, but really I made it wi' you in mind."

In lieu of words, Finny quivered with delight.

"An' for Miss Mey Rin, I made this crépe: simple no-frills raspberries n' cream. With a touch of lemon sugar for class. That's what my bluster an' noise has to show for itself."

"There's a bit of paper stuck into it with a toothpick, there is," said Mey Rin with barely a glance at him, though Bard noticed that her face glowed pink for a moment while a smile twitched across her lips.

"Oh, that." Bard dropped his eyes and fumbled with his matchbook. "That's just a voucher entitling you to a kowtow, by me, at a time of your choosin'. It were Sebastian's idea."

Finny removed his fork from his mouth long enough to ask, "But Bard, what will you eat for breakfast?"

The chef crumbled one of the charred crépe wafers over the dish of the watery orange sauce and shoved a spoonful into his mouth. "I wouldn't make 'em if I weren't willing to eat 'em now, would I?" he said with a grimace.

Sebastian cleared his throat. He stood in the kitchen doorway and held up his silver watch. "Tic tock, tic tock, Baldroy. Seven hours to go. Mind that you keep your execrable whipped cream away from anything the Young Master might touch. It is a garnish, not an entrée."

"Seven hours? Shit." Bard hastily gathered every dirty pan and dish within arms' reach—including his own bowl of burned crépe crumbs—and dumped them all in the washbasin. "Finny, the minute you're finished I need you to double-time out to the henhouse and bring me every last egg you can find. Mey-Rin, I need you to—" he lowered his voice, and noticed that she'd gone beet red. "I'd like you to stay to help, umm, read out the ingredients to me and such out of this very nice book, which some kind friends gave me, if you can spare the time."

"I—I would have to ask Mr. Se—Sebastian."

"Stay and read for him, by all means, if the pair of you can figure out how to interact without distraction," said the butler. "Chef Baldroy, professional though he is, may find that his neck—or at least a finger—is on the chopping block if he fails. Sugar cages will not spin themselves."


	6. 6 - Sugar Cages

**6 – Sugar Cages**

"This ain't working, Bard!" Mey-Rin slammed shut the cover of _Mastering the Art of French Cooking_. "What with you second-guessing every word I say to you, I'm starting to think you don't trust me at all, no you don't."

"Trust?" Bard grit his teeth. He shook cigarette ash onto the floor since he'd be swabbing the whole place down to start from scratch again anyway. "When I question you tellin' me to put a cup of salt into the meringue, know that it's a matter of common sense. Trust got nothing to do with it."

"An' who made you the almighty professor of meringue? You've put your thumb into the yolk of every egg you've cracked. When was the last time you tried to make one? What's that you say? Never? I thought as much." She poured milk into glass and thumped it down in front of the exasperated chef. "Now drink something before you get even more grumpy than you already are."

"No one puts a cup of salt in anything! Ever!" Bard pounded his fists on the table, sending globs of over-salted custard and egg-shell-ridden, mysteriously un-fluffy raw meringue flying up to spatter the ceiling. "Or can't you read—" He almost said "either," but stopped himself at the last second. No one but Sebastian knew how terrible he was with books. "Why do I put up with this? And with you lot? I quit. Let me go drown myself in a ditch full of flamin' gin, like a man. Where's my blowtorch?" He took a determined step toward the pantry.

"Hold 'im down, Finny." Mey-Rin blocked his path. "His blood sugar is crashing, and 'e'll be but a puddle of gibbering nerves if 'e don't get nothing in his system."

The gardener grasped Bard from behind and pinned his arms to his side while Mey-Rin held the chef's nose and poured the milk down his throat. When he stopped spluttering and straining against Finny's iron grip, they set him gently into a chair.

"I'm sorry, Mey-Rin," said Bard at last when he'd recovered somewhat. "I didn't mean to get so angry. It weren't at you, though. I'm shouting at myself, really. Shouting's what chefs do, innit?" He stared down at the cigarette pinched between his finger and thumb. "You and Finny take a rest while I mop up and try to decide which finger to present to the earl on a chopping block. At least my trigger finger's safe. I 'ope."

"Bard!" cried Finny. "Don't say that. The young master isn't so cruel."

"Sebastian said my fingers was on the line, and 'e don't give no empty threats. Do you think if this little one 'ere was a stump, it would give me an air of mystery?"

Finny bit his lip as if holding back tears. "Stop it," he snapped suddenly with uncharacteristic force. "I like your hands the way they are."

Something about the way Finny said this caught Bard off guard. He looked askance at the gardener, whose face now glowed a strawberry-red.

"There's still three hours until the dinner," piped up Mey-Rin to fill the awkward silence. "At least wait for the verdict to put your 'ead in the noose."

"I know, I know," said Bard, "but I prefer a little mental preparation. Finny, how are our egg supplies?"

"Eggs?" said the scarlet-faced gardener. "That, err, I mean to say…between three batches of bad Crème Anglaise and five lit'ral meringue flops, this little egg here is the last one on the whole estate."

Bard wondered idly if he should save the young master the trouble and dock his own finger with his carving knife himself.

"I'll run into town to buy more," offered Finny before Bard could even ask the favor.

"I still have to press the napkins and tablecloth before the guests arrive," added Mey-Rin hurriedly, though Bard suspected that Sebastian had already done it. Probably she was just sick of him and the claustrophobic kitchen. He could hardly blame her.

The maid and gardener hurried off to their respective tasks. Bard couldn't tackle his next, undoubtedly doomed, batches without any eggs, so he set about swabbing the floor, walls and spattered ceiling. By the time he'd finished Finny still hadn't returned with the eggs, and he didn't expect to see Mey-Rin in the kitchen again that evening unless she were there under some form of duress.

The hands of the kitchen clock seemed to slip forward faster than usual, yet still Finny hadn't come. There had to be something else productive to do.

Sugar cages. He'd nearly forgotten about the garnish for his crème anglaise—he usually did forget garnishes, dismissing them as affectations of Sebastian-style froofy cuisine. But time wouldn't fill itself, and sugar cages, as far as he knew, contained no eggs. After five more minutes spent flipping through _Mastering the Art of French Cooking_, volumes one and two, he remembered that books had lists in the back called indexes. At long last he found the correct page. Immediately his eyes were drawn to a skull and crossbones in an inset near the bottom of the page. He ran his fingers over the accompanying text until the letters unraveled themselves.

"Warning: working with hot sugar can be dangerous. Melted sugar adheres to skin, causing deep burns and scarring," he read aloud slowly. "Pouring water into boiling sugar can be explosive and even lethal." Bard's mouth quirked into a lopsided grin. "At last. Somethin' I can wrap my 'ead around."

He set to work at the stove with a pan of caster sugar and water, bringing it to a boil and holding it there until it formed thin brittle threads when he drizzled it off the spoon into a glass of cold water. He barely had to even glance at the recipe—somehow just knowing that he handled lethal materials activated some instinctual switch in his brain. He deftly drizzled the molten sugar substance over the bowl of a greased ladle in a thin spider-web pattern, and when it had cooled he used his thumbs to pry it free in one piece. The sensation of succeeding at anything on the first try was so foreign to him that he stared for a full minute, bewildered, at this perfect crisp cage of caramelized sugar threads in front of him before he remembered that he needed a dozen of the things and left the first cage to cool on a square of waxed parchment. By the time Finny finally arrived, Bard had spun over twenty perfect sugar cages, then cleaned and polished the pan.

"I'm so sorry, Bard," panted Finny, setting a basket of eggs on the table. "The village grocer only had six eggs left so I ran to the Blackburn farm, and then saw the hen lady on Chickory Lane, and I still only could get two dozen. The whole county is in shortage, thanks to us."

"Only two dozen?" Bard's little finger began to tingle. He did a few figures in his head. "That means only one casualty batch."

"What?"

"It means we've a slim margin for error."

Finny's upbeat expression collapsed like a souffle. "I never seem to do anything right on the first try. Do you?"

Bard glanced around the room at the sugar cages lined up on a sideboard. "Yes, actually." He felt slightly hurt that Finny hadn't even noticed them. "Here, take the book. It's open to the recipe. Read from the top, but hurry. We don't have much time left. Double the recipe, so it don't take so long."

"Yes, chef!" Finny seemed to have regained his enthusiasm somewhat. "To start, we need twelve eggs. You're supposed to separate the eggs, but it don't say how.

"Whites in one bowl, yolks in the other."

"But won't it be faster to just put six eggs in one bowl and six in the other?"

"That ain't how that works," said Bard dryly. He cracked an egg over a bowl and passed the yolk back and forth between eggshell halves until most of the white had dripped down. Just as he was about to toss the yolk in a second bowl, his thumb slipped and pierced it. "You slippery bastard," he growled as a drop of yolk fell into the whites. At least it wasn't much. What difference could it possibly make? "Come on Finny, just read what it says."

Eagerly Finny rattled off a list of ingredients while Bard measured them into the bowl with the whites.

"Wait…"

"What now?" Bard was already whisking the concoction for all he was worth.

"Umm…I think some of those ingredients were supposed to go in the other bowl."

"You think?"

"First there's a list, then at the very end they tell you what goes where. They should warn you, or put things in better order or something. "

"You and Mey-Rin tell me something completely different every time." Bard slapped the bowl upside-down over the sink. He glanced uneasily at his final dozen eggs. "Think of all the orphans and legless Crimean veterans we might have fed with all them wasted batches." He tried to make Finny stand aside, but the gardener was adamant that he would help, and read more carefully this time. He even grasped Bard's hand and wouldn't let go until the chef handed the book back to him. "Twist my arm then," said the chef, giving way at last. "But we're only doing a six-egg batch this time."

For the next batch (was it the sixth? Seventh?) Finny read with more care, but when Bard got to the part where he had to whisk until the whites reached the stiff-peak stage, they still hadn't firmed after ten full minutes of beating.

"Not again…"

"Let me try," said Finny. "Maybe they need a stronger arm. Not that your arms aren't fine the way they are. Because they are very fine and, um, I'll just be quiet now." He trailed off into another awkward silence.

"Thank you?" Bard reprised his confused look.

Finny channeled his evident frustration into the egg whites, but even after another ten minutes they still hadn't stiffened.

Bard stared at his hands, trying to memorize how they looked with all their fingers, and already felt twangs of nostalgia.

Sebastian breezed into the kitchen with a veritable gust of shiny black coattails to check his Boeuf a la Bourguignonne which had been braising for the past four hours, and for the first time Bard noticed how the kitchen had filled with the hearty scent of it. At the sight of the dud meringue, the butler shook his head sadly as if he'd expected such an outcome all along.

"You've been sticking your thumbs in the yolks, haven't you?" Sebastian said with a sigh.

"What's it to you?" snapped Bard. "How I break my eggs is my business."

"Well you can save your breath and stop whisking. If it's not thickened by now, you're merely wasting your time. Better start over. The Bay of Fundy delegation has moved to the dining room, and I'm serving up the first course as soon as I've plated it. You have a three-quarters of an hour at most to put the finishing touches on your piece de resistance. Otherwise…" The butler mimed a chopping motion. "You will suffer consequences, Chef Baldroy. You can hardly claim that you had no time to prepare."

By the time Bard had wiped out his bowls, Sebastian had divided the Boeuf Bourguignonne among twelve plates, arranged alongside delicate towers of mashed parsnip and celeriac shaped with crimped metal forms, and garnished with fresh herbs.

"Tick tock, tick tock." As the butler wheeled his dinner trolley past Bard, he knocked the chef with an elbow. "Perhaps you should rethink your tactics, squad leader. And your chain of command."

"Meaning what?" Bard shouted after him.

"Slamming your face into a wall won't convince the wall to move out of your way." The butler gave him a coy smile. "Think about it," he said, and disappeared.

"Shall we try again, Bard?" Finny reached for the last six eggs.

"No." Bard slumped into a chair. "'E's right." He pressed his palms into his eyes. "I need to think. What do I keep doing wrong?"

Finny shrugged. "I like you just the way you are."

Bard was prevented from snarling some sarcastic remark he would have immediately regretted by the arrival of Mey-Rin. The maid entered the kitchen clutching a freshly laundered chef's coat and apron to her bodice.

"Chef Bard wants to know what he's doing wrong?" she said with a little too much glee in her voice. "I'll tell you, yes I will." She dropped the apron and coat into Bard's lap. "You never know when to keep your hands off. "

Bard decided that perhaps this was a more insightful statement that he'd cared to admit. "And these?" he asked instead, looking at the clothes she'd handed him.

"Are for when you present yourself and your dessert to the young master. That's what Mr. Sebastian said."

A pair of handcuffs slipped out of the apron when he lifted it, and clattered to the floor.

"And I guess this is a message from Mr. Sebastian as well." Bard didn't ask it like a question. Because of course it was a message. He retrieved the cuffs and spun them on his finger, staring at them intensely as he did so.

"I don't like that look on 'im," said Mey-Rin to Finny. "Bard's getting that look again. He's about to do something rash and…and horribly stupid."

Though the handcuffs didn't have a key, the wrist sections were open. Bard snapped one manacle on his own wrist and it locked itself with a click.

"Mey-Rin, make 'im stop!" cried Finny.

The maid planted herself in front of the chef, and tried unsuccessfully to distract him from the biscuit tin full of pre-rolled cigarettes he'd pulled from a cupboard. He shoved a dozen or so end-down in a glass.

"Bard! You aren't thinking this through. Don't do something you'll regret."

Meanwhile Bard lit a candle and set it next to his cigarette glass and teacup-ashtray at a corner of the table. He placed Mastering the Art of French Cooking in front of it all, opened to "Crème Anglaise with Floating Islands and Sugar Cages." He pulled up a stool, seated himself, and before Finny could get a headlock on him, shackled himself to the table leg.

"What 'ave you done, Bard!" shouted Mey-Rin and Finny in chorus.

"I think they call it _mise en place_."

Mey-Rin threw her hands up in despair. "I'll go find Mr. Sebastian, 'e must have the key." Finny just choked back tears.

"Don't bother, Mey-Rin. It's too late now." Bard leaned forward and plucked a fresh cigarette from the glass with his teeth. He lit it with the candle and inhaled deeply. "I'm the chef of this godforsaken kitchen. I'm the one who should be directing operations here. Sebastian was right, and you too, Mey-Rin. The only way I can finish this blasted recipe is if I don't lay one cursed finger on a goddamned thing." He blew a cloud of smoke at the pages in front of him. "Now wash your 'ands, you two. I'm going to tell you exactly what to do."

"Yes, chef."

Bard stared at the first line of text and silently willed the letters to cease their somersaults and line the fuck up already, but these were particularly mutinous bastards. When he moved his hand to try to cover the words, the handcuffs stopped him short.

"Bugger all." Perhaps he hadn't thought this through enough after all. He glanced at the clock. Dinner would have been served by now. He had twenty minutes left, at most. A drop of sweat slid down his nose and splattered on the paper.

Then a finger appeared on the page, and slid across the letters one at a time, slow enough for Bard to unravel their meaning. He glanced up, and into the older, serenely smiling face of Phantomhive's former butler.

"Mr. Tanaka."

The older gentleman gave his soft characteristic laugh and sipped from the mug of green tea clasped in his other hand. Tenaka had become such a fixture at the tea kettle that Bard barely registered his presence in the kitchen anymore. The man rarely said anything intelligible, and didn't now—not that Bard expected him to. But there was no time to waste on niceties, and Bard wasn't given to niceties in general, certainly not under duress.

"Mey-Rin," barked Bard in his best chef/sergeant voice, "since you gave me hell earlier about breaking yolks, do you know how to separate an egg?"

"Yes, chef. Better 'n you, chef!"

"You're on meringue duty. Get to it! Finny, you measure out the milk and cream, exactly as I tell you, into that pan. You're my custard cook. Can you handle the heat?"

"Yes, chef!" Finny's tear-streaked face bore a fresh grin. He poured out the amounts Bard read to him.

"Good. Add a teaspoon of vanilla. Heat it on a low flame. Low! The second you see bubbles, you let me know."

"Yes, chef!"

Bard continued giving directions in his brusque manner while sweat glistened on his face. Each time his cigarette ran low he spat the butt into his teacup and lit a new one in the candle.

"Aren't those whites stiff yet, Mey-Rin? Pass 'em off to Finny and mind the stove. Ah, now that's looking like a meringue. You mean any yolk at all will ruin it? Why didn't anyone bother to tell me? Well done, you lot, well done, but we aren't out of the frying pan yet. Look sharp, look sharp. Three minutes left on the simmering. Too hot! See how it spatters? Cool it off, quick!"

"Really, Bard," said Mey-Rin with an amused curl of her lip. She tilted her glasses slightly so that he could catch a glimpse of her eyes. "When 'ave you ever complained about something being too hot?" But she dipped the bottom of the pan in a basin of cold water so that it sizzled.

Bard swore under his breath and tugged at the handcuffs. Tenaka's guiding finger reoriented him in the text. "We need to poach spoonfuls of meringue in the hot cream. Them's the 'floating islands'. What kind of inane dish is this? Who invents this shit? Finny, stir one hundred grams of sugar into the yolks, and be quick about it!"

They whisked and poached while Bard read until he was certain his eyes were bleeding. His attention flickered from the text to the clock to Finny and Mey-Rin, his line cooks, barking corrections or warnings whenever he sensed some grievous error in the making, and his fingers at stake.

"Plate it, hurry! Thirty seconds to go. No, not an actual plate, use a parfait glass, Sebastian always uses a parfait glass. Pour in the custard, now the meringues, easy there—Finny, wipe up those drips! We can't serve a sticky glass to the young master else he'll think he's got a stable of asses for his staff. The sugar cage, don't forget the garnish you lot! Hands off, Finny, you'll crush it. Mey-Rin will do it, but you'll have to guide her along. She's got no depth perception. And…" Bard shut his eyes as the maid dangled the sugar cage precariously over the parfait glass. She gasped. He forced his eyes open. And…perfection. It was a breathtaking sight.

"The earl will take his dessert now, Chef Baldroy."

Bard wished for nothing more at that moment than a pair of free hands, which which to pull up his goggles. A pair of hot tears scorched his cheeks, despite his attempts to blink them into oblivion.

"Allow me." The butler leaned over Bard and unlocked the cuffs, his key in one hand as if he'd fully expected to find the chef in such a state. "Now put on that fresh coat and apron, hurry. I see one presentable crème anglaise. But where are the other eleven?"

Bard bit his cigarette in half. "I—but I—"

Mr. Tanaka, meanwhile, pointed to some tiny words in the lower corner of the page.

"Serves three," Bard read aloud, then added, "or one earl, who likes his parfait glasses full." He began to untie his apron with shaking fingers. "Well, what are you lot waiting for? Finny, Mey-Rin, plate the rest of the sugar cages. Yes, put them directly on the plates." The chef shed his stained and burned coat, and pulled on the fresh one.

Before he knew it, Bard stood with Sebastian just outside the grand dining room. On the trolley sat one perfect crème anglaise and eleven sugar cages, garnishes garnishing nothing.

"This is how you choose to go out, then?" asked the butler with a heavy dollop of misgiving in his voice.

"With my boots on." Bard and adjusted his collar and flexed his fingers, perhaps for the last time.

"Wait here then." Sebastian stepped into the dining room. "And now, my lord, I would beg your permission to call forth our chef Baldroy with the dessert." Sebastian leaned back out into the hall where Bard waited with the trolley, and plucked the chef's cigarette from his mouth. "There. You are now slightly more presentable than before." He straightened one of the spun sugar garnishes. "Do proceed, and mind your tongue, man. I placed the chopping block there on the second shelf of the trolley, for your convenience."


	7. 7 - The Chopping Block

**Author's Note:**_ Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to read, review, follow or favorite. When I first started this story, I had assumed it would just be a collection of vignettes, but at some point it took on a life of its own as I discovered new depths to the characters. I wanted to end this one on a climax, but that doesn't mean I'm done writing Kuro fic. If you liked this, please leave a review to let me know! Thanks again for sticking with me this far._

_ETA: As of 6/20 I made some tweaks to the final part of Chapter 7, per Kimberly T.'s helpful comments in the review section._

* * *

**7 - The Chopping Block**

"There's a trick to all this, right?" whispered Bard, grin faltering as he hesitated on the dining room threshold. "You've got a whole fleet of desserts waiting in the wings, don't you Sebastian? Any moment now they'll ride out to save the day like the bleedin' cavalry. You're just playin' a little joke on me."

"I never joke." Sebastian set a hand on Bard's back. The chef flinched—the touch was icy, even through his jacket and the butler's glove. "Why would I steal your limelight? You hardly get any as it is." And he gave Bard a firm shove through the door.

As Bard approached the table, he had an inkling that this dinner party was not the typical decorous Phantomhive affair. There was a smell of cigarettes and spilled scotch in the air—two substances usually restricted to after dinner in the smoking room. Voices in heated argument rose above the stained tablecloth, then fell to whispers as the speakers noticed Bard. They seemed anxious not to be overheard by a mere servant. The chef glanced over his shoulder. Sebastian stood in the doorway for a moment, but at a signal from the young Earl of Phantomhive, he disappeared.

Bard cleared his throat. Immediately the dozen pairs of eyes—eleven and a half to be precise, counting the earl—swiveled to focus on him. Somehow he managed to push aside thoughts of inevitable catastrophe. Being the center of attention, even now, perked him up somewhat, as if he absorbed energy from the stares. He made his bow and placed a hand on his hip. Too jaunty, too casual, yes yes damn it all. Best to just get it over with. So what if he Sebastian gave him trouble for his attitude later? He was going to literally catch all nine circles of hell anyway.

"Your Lordship, today's dessert will be a crème—"

The young Earl of Phantomhive, an elfin lad of thirteen, held up a hand. The boy wore, in addition to his usual eye patch, all manner of lace, velvet, ribbons and Bard didn't know what else, along with an air of utter blasé.

"What happened to you?" The earl gave Bard a long, suspicious look.

"To me, young master?" Bard let his eyes flit to the side, unsure if he was the one being addressed. The room had grown mostly quiet, though some of the guests still muttered among themselves.

"You have a lovely bruised eye. Did a batch of particularly mutinous ingredients rough you up?" asked the earl with an impish grin, raising a nervous chuckle from some of the guests.

"Something like that, my lord." Bard had nearly forgotten about his shiner. Of course he wasn't about to rat out Mey-Rin, so he shrugged uneasily instead. "As I was sayin', today's dessert is a crème anglaise—"

"Well perhaps I've changed my mind," interrupted the petulant young earl. "I'm bored stiff and I promised these gentlemen here an interesting game of sorts." His single blue eye appeared to rove the room for a moment, then settled back on the chef. "Though perhaps I could use you as well. I order you to stay for our game, Bard."

Bard took a deep breath and forced an indulgent smile onto his face. While he revered the Earl of Phantomhive, he doubted he'd ever grow accustomed to jumping at the every whim of a mere kid. He moved to the earl's side, lowering his voice so that the rest of the party wouldn't hear. "With all due respect, my lord, I'd like to get this dessert off my back first. Then you can chop off my finger or what have you, I'll get to go to bed before ten o'clock, and we'll all be 'appy. Right, sir?"

The young earl gave the chef a look as if he'd just changed into one of Lady Elizabeth's frilly confections. "Don't be ridiculous, Bard," he said softly. "I'm not going to chop off anyone's fingers."

"You're not, my lord?"

"Certainly not."

"Well that's a relief. Mr. Sebastian kept dropping these rather obvious hints…" For a second Bard fantasized strangling the butler with the man's own silk cravat. Maybe he had been the butt of a joke after all.

"Who could look at me and think me capable of such a thing? Such barbarity is supposed to be beneath me." The young earl pressed his fingers together the way he often did while pondering whether to move his knight next, or his rook. "But it's not beneath you, now, is it? That's why I need you to stay for our game."

"Wait, what?!"

"I've been boasting all evening about the unwavering loyalty of my servants. I know you don't want to disappoint me, Bard."

"No, my lord, I…" the chef pretended to smooth his apron as if it might somehow mask his agitation. The guests were starting to stare. "Can I ask what exactly you promised 'em, sir? That I'd chop off my own finger, or someone else's?"

"Well now. That depends on the outcome of our game, doesn't it? Stop acting so dense. Didn't Sebastian send you up with the chopping block?"

"That he did, sir, but—"

"Well, go get it then. Place it here on the table where I can see. Sir Percy, pass up that napkin, won't you? And you, Mr. Hiram, bring over that bucket of ice. Just set the champagne aside. I'm sure it's flat by now, anyway."

Bard had little choice but to bob his head and comply. As he bent over the trolley to retrieve the same wooden board he usually used for slicing raw meat, Sebastian returned holding a napkin-draped silver tray in his hands. _Sebastian's brought out the cavalry_, Bard thought, nearly giddy with relief. What did he have under there? Madeleines or _petit fours_?

"Thank the blazes you're back," hissed the chef. "The young master is so set on some sick game of his, 'e won't even let me hand out dessert. Maybe you can talk some sense into 'im." Bard didn't really expect the butler to take his side, but Sebastian seemed to treat him more coldly than usual, if that were possible.

"What did I tell you about minding your tongue? A finger or two will be the least of your worries if you fail to conduct yourself like the humble servant you seem to continually forget yourself to be." Sebastian whisked the cloth from his tray to reveal the largest, sharpest santoku knife the kitchen had to offer. The chef himself had whetted it only the day before.

Bard tried and failed to meet Sebastian's coal-glow stare, dropping his gaze to the floor so quickly he thought his eyeballs had seared. He wished someone would tell him what was going on, as clearly some very important facts were being kept from him. At the very least he wished Sebastian, or the earl, or someone would just shout at him already for trying to pass off a tray of garnishes as dessert. If this "game" was some sort of staged punishment, why were they dancing all namby-pamby around the issue? But there the sugar cages still sat on the trolley, forgotten for the time being.

At the sight of the knife on the butler's tray, the boisterous party recovered to its previous volume. Some of the inebriated men had even started singing, though they didn't seem to agree on the tune or words. Sebastian, meanwhile, had cleared the bottles and glasses from an area near the head of the table where the Earl of Phantomhive sat. He directed Bard to set the chopping block to the earl's immediate left.

Sebastian placed the santoku knife in Bard's hand.

"Just hold it and stand there," said the butler in a low tone.

"That's all?" Bard's voice quavered. "Does this 'ave something to do with dessert?"

"Obliquely, perhaps. If more is required, I'll be the first to inform you."

Bard stood still, aware that all eyes were on him and the blade. The butler stood slightly behind him, so that the chef barely had to move his head to catch a glimpse of his shadow across the shoulder of his white jacket.

Meanwhile, the Earl of Phantomhive had risen to his feet. He raised a spoon to his glass and tapped it twice. The room fell instantly silent.

"Ladies and gentlemen. I hope you all enjoyed your dinner, served in the grand Phantomhive style."

Scattered applause rose from the guests, some of whom had loosened belts and cravats.

The earl paused until the noise died away, and continued. "I've gathered you all here because you have something in common with one another. Something quite intimate, you might say. More so than a general fondness for braised beef, champagne and scotch."

There was another collective chortle from the good-humored guests.

"I do hope you all like games. Because I like games. Do you? Yes? Good. But before I get to that, let me tell you a story which I heard from a close associate of mine. In the country of Japan there was until the last decade a class of warrior nobles called the samurai. These samurai had a code of ethics, rather like the chivalry of our English knights. When a samurai dishonored his superiors, instead of being punished, he had to apologize and punish himself."

Bard felt a prickle as the hair rose on the back of his neck. He could feel Sebastian's presence close behind him, and wondered if the it was a breeze, or the man's own cold breath. He tried to focus his mind on the earl. As the earl spoke, his single eye flitted about the audience, settling on one guest at a time, and eventually landed on the chef. Bard blinked. Looking into the boy's eye, he might as well have stared down the barrel of a gun.

"Apologies are all well and good, if they are sincere. But sometimes groveling is just not enough. Which leads us to yubitsume. Cutting off the tip of the little finger. Which, you might guess, is a very effective game indeed."

Bard shuddered at the cold hand on his shoulder.

"Hold up the knife, Bard," whispered Sebastian. "Ensure every last one of them gets a good look."

Bard flexed his fingers and squeezed the knife's handle. He wished he had a cigarette to settle his rising nausea, and sucked down wisps of second-hand smoke that had settled like a canopy over the table.

The earl had paused to allow his words to sink in. "Yubitsume is the ultimate apology, and actions speak louder than words. A samurai relies on his fingers to balance his sword. A swordsman without a fingertip places himself at the mercy of his betters. You have all been called here today because I am the Queen's Guard Dog, and I am not pleased. Everyone here should know the particulars of his or her own case. You owe her majesty—and myself, in her stead—an apology."

The chamber had grown so silent and tense that a fork dropped on the thick carpeting caused most of the party to jump. Bard realized then that no one in the room paid him any attention whatsoever. They all gaped in horror at the knife, but by the guilt-stricken looks on their faces, they all imagined the loss of their own personal fingertips. No one gave a shit about the chef except the chef himself.

"So this is our game," pronounced the earl with a flourish of his hand. "Do you, my guests, wish to leave this room? And in what state? The chopping block is here, but only for the idiotically brave. Cash may be used to cover what groveling cannot. While you ponder your next move, my chef will serve up the dessert."

The point of Sebastian's elbow nudged Bard in the back. "Your cue. Leave the knife."

Bard swung the knife so that the blade stuck into the wood, holding it fast. He lurched for the trolley in a fog of nicotine withdrawal. Behind him the guests clamored for the earl's mercy or offered up escalating sums of sterling to pay off their guilty consciences. The plates rattled on the trolley as the chef pushed it forward with too much force, but he didn't much care.

"Today's dessert will be hypothetical crème anglais with meringue islands and lit'ral sugar cages." Bard doubted anyone even heard him.

He set a pair of plates down between two lady guests, who glared first at the sugar cages, then at him with confusion and contempt on their faces. A grizzled man with thick muttonchops and a gaudy red cravat choked on a rude name, apparently remembering at the last minute that he was in mixed company. He grabbed hold of Bard's apron and held him fast.

"What is the meaning of this? Who do you think you are? Baldroy, was that your name? Has your master been made aware of what you're trying to pass off as dessert?"

Bard had trouble enough maintaining a formal demeanor during the mildest of public appearances, and by this point felt he had little to lose by dropping the whole sham.

He cast a black look down at the thick-set man with the muttonchops. "It's Bard. I only let people holding guns to my head call me Baldroy. With one exception." He tilted his head in Sebastian's direction. "An' if you don't unhand me, sir, I'll break your nose."

The butler had observed this exchange. He held a gloved hand to his temple and shook his head at the chef in exasperation.

Neither could Bard ignore the single, saucer-wide eye of his young master.

"What the devil is going on there?" cried the Earl, at the rise of complaints among his guests.

A hush fell on the room. Bard prayed for spontaneous combustion. Then a broad smile spread over the earl's face and he began to speak in the same easy, measured manner as before.

"Ah, my dearest guests. The dessert you are being served by the Phantomhive Household is a calculated symbol of what will happen to you, should you fail to make amends to the Queen and her Guard Dog. Behold the cage. That is where the rotten lot of you belong, and where you'll end up if you don't appeal to my mercy." A flick of his finger signaled Bard to continue handing out the plates.

The earl himself was served his parfait glass by Sebastian. As Bard passed near him and the butler while making the dessert rounds, he overheard a snippet of their exchange.

"—brilliant idea with the cages, Sebastian, but at least give me a better warning next time. I don't always extemporize as well as all that."

"Yes, my lord."

Eventually the last of the guests had departed, most of them shamefaced, quivering with the relief of having escaped with intact hands, and with their wallets thousands of pounds sterling lighter. Sebastian hovered over the young earl while Bard cleared the mess of plates, glasses and flatware from the table. The santoku knife still stuck blade-first in the chopping block. Not a single guest had dared to touch it.

"Sebastian," said the earl, loudly enough for Bard to overhear. "The custard tastes different than how you usually make it."

"It was a…slightly different recipe, my lord," replied the butler.

"I don't like it. Take it away."

Bard, still gathering the plates and shards of sugar cage onto his trolley, froze before the chopping block . He grasped the santoku knife's handle almost without thinking. With one deep breath he raised the blade until its spine touched his shoulder. He pressed his curled left hand, knuckles-down, onto the scored wooden board with his pinky finger stretched out like a worthless bit of carrot top.

The earl's voice echoed in his ear. "Make me a new one, Sebastian. The old way. Whatever this is, I don't want it."

"Yes, my lord."

The falling blade flashed in the candlelight before Bard's eyes, like lightning before the thunderclap.

* * *

"It were only a bit of eggs, milk, and sugar." Mey-Rin crouched at Bard's side and painstakingly wrapped his hand in strips of old cloth napkins. "Stop being so dramatic."

The chef slumped forward in his chair. After she tied off the ends of the bandage, he was handcuffed to the leg of the kitchen table for the third time that day. Though he'd sustained a nasty gash in his palm, he'd kept the finger.

"It's for your own good," said the maid. "So you don't go senselessly harming yourself or setting things on fire." She ran a tentative hand through Bard's hair but retracted it quickly when Sebastian returned, and turned all her attentions to him instead.

Sebastian had suffered the worst of Bard's mutilation attempt. As the chef had swung the heavy blade at his outstretched digit, the butler appeared as if from nowhere and, by what martyr's instinct Bard couldn't begin to guess, caught the blade on his own outstretched hands.

Mey-Rin hovered over the butler with her bottle of iodine, but he shrugged her off and ducked out of the kitchen. When he returned a few minutes later he wore fresh, clean gloves. Blood was already seeping through Bard's bandages. His nose dripped splotches of red onto the tile from when the butler had wrestled him to the dining room carpet. Sebastian, however, had no trace of blood visible on him anywhere. Not anymore.

"I'm quite capable of patching myself, Mey-Rin," insisted Sebastian. "Please leave us."

The flustered maid bobbed a curtsey and withdrew.

"I failed the young master," said Bard as soon as they were alone. He pressed his forehead into the surface of the table and screwed his eyes shut to avoid having to look Sebastian in the face. "I disgraced the entire household. And you."

"You didn't fail, Baldroy. Not entirely."

"I should 'a lost that finger. At least I'd have proved something. If I can't do anything else for the young master, I want 'im to know I can do that. You should 'a let me follow through."

Bard thought back to the dining room. The butler had slammed him face-first into the carpet. Sebastian then dug a knee into his back and wrenched his arm at an unholy angle until Bard dropped the knife, slippery with blood.

"Really, Bard?" came the sound of the earl's wry voice, and the chef strained his neck to look up at him. "Do you expect me to think you're a samurai?"

Bard could only grind his teeth in pain. He glanced from his master to the unfinished crème anglais on the table, and the earl followed his eyes. When he looked at Bard again, he spoke in a softened voice. Even the cynical line of his mouth had lost some rigidity.

"Instead of a trooper who's only now learning to cook?"

At the scratch-hiss sound of an ignited match, Bard opened his eyes. Sebastian leaned over the kitchen table, pinching one of the chef's pre-rolled cigarettes between his thumb and forefinger.

"Here."

Bard accepted the cigarette between his lips. He leaned forward when Sebastian lowered the match, then took a long, exhausted drag.

"Maybe you set me up fer failure," said the chef once his heart rate had returned to its normal, nicotine-regulated rate.

"Neither the earl nor myself wished for you to fail. I merely needed you to succeed to the absolute minimum required. What we wanted most was proof of what you are made of. And how far you are willing to go." Sebastian bent down leaned his smooth, menacing face so close to Bard's that the chef pulled back for fear of setting the butler's collar on fire with his cigarette. "I told you earlier, Baldroy. I've had you eating from my hand all along."

Sebastian then straightened and turned as if to leave, but Bard strained at his handcuffs and shouted after him.

"An entire day wasted, slaving in this wretched hole! One crème anglaise, perfect beyond description. And 'e didn't even want it. It just gets to ya."

Sebastian spun slowly to face him. "Despite his rather adult manner of speech, the young master has what we might call an immature palate. Basic custard is familiar to him, and when crème anglaise with meringue islands takes him by surprise, he retreats to what he knows best. But that doesn't mean that yours was not adequate."

"Well, was it?" The words rushed from Bards mouth on a cloud of smoke. "You're the one that took it away. The dessert, I mean. Perhaps you…tried it?" He raised his eyes to Sebastian's, and waited.

The butler hesitated, as if unsure how much information he should disclose. "It tasted most distinctly," he said at last, "of your blood, sweat and tears. There are some people who would find the evidence of such an effort most delectable."

"I'm sorry about your hands, Mr. Sebastian."

"If it would make you feel better, you can replace my torn and bloodied pair of gloves from your wages. And if you do decide to throw yourself at my feet, an appointment would be appreciated. You know how busy I am."

Bard nodded absently at this, more concerned with the tingle of nicotine in his bloodstream than the conversation. Suddenly he snapped back into himself when he realized Sebastian had brought out a bottle of whiskey and was measuring out a scant finger of the stuff into a glass. The butler placed the tumbler on the table in front of Bard.

"Here's to the Chef."

"I…" Bard badly wanted to raise the glass to his mouth, but the handcuffs held him fast. "Huh?"

"Oh, of course, how remiss of me." Sebastian pulled a red-and-white striped straw from his waistcoat pocket, bent its flexible neck in the same quick movement he might have used to snap the spine of a cornish game hen, and stuck it into the whiskey tumbler. "I will see you at zero dark thirty tomorrow morning, then. That will give you enough time to shower and clean up before breakfast preparations begin. Perhaps I'll even let you flip the _pain perdu_."

Sebastian departed for the night, and Bard realized he'd left behind an official-looking sheet of paper along with the next day's menu. At the top, by the light of his cigarette end, he made out the words "Application" and "London Culinary School" and his own name written in pen along one of the lines. And there at the bottom was the signature of Ciel, Earl of Phantomhive.

###


End file.
